Inkjet printers employ printheads that eject drops of ink from a plurality of orifices or nozzles, typically arranged in one or more columns or arrays, onto a page or sheet of print medium. A scanning type printhead employs one or more printhead dies mounted on a carriage. The carriage is moved or scanned across a scan axis relative to a sheet of print medium while a controlled sequence of individual drops of ink are ejected from the nozzles to so that the dies work together to collectively form a band or “swath” of an image, such as a character, symbol, or other graphic, on the print medium. Between scans, the print medium is incrementally advanced relative to the scan axis so that the image may be incrementally printed.
In contrast, a wide array printhead employs a plurality of stationary printhead dies mounted on a support or bar, the plurality of stationary dies being arranged relative to one another so as to span a page of print medium. Such a printhead is sometimes referred to a print bar. Each of the plurality of the printhead dies is controlled to eject individual drops of ink from the nozzles, with the drops of ink from the plurality of stationary printhead dies together forming an image on the print medium. The print medium is continually advanced so that an image can be completed in a single pass.